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Pantomimes: bouncy, bawdy, seasonal, and full of fun

By

TERRY DOYLE

’Tis the season to be jolly. ’Tis also, at least in the arts world, the season for a small controversy.- For once again it will surely feature another episode of that popular divertissement, the public verdict on pantomine. Mention the word pantomime and people conjure up magnificent visions of a theatre stage filled with demon kings, wicked witches, dancing, singing, spicy jokes, and other features borrowed from every art form ranging from morality plays to vaudeville and stitched together to produce an evening of fantasy and fun. Others hear the term and lovingly remember the stage occupied by gallant lads (played by women) and odd girls (played by men) talking very wittily and prettily in rhymed couplets. Thus the battle is joined; and voices will cry, as they have for two centuries, that panto was best 50 or 100 years ago or that panto is thriving now despite its changing looks. Pantomime in England has always been in a transitional state. Even its earliest form was only a refinement of an existing entertainment, the amusing characters — particularly the Harlequin role — from the ingenuity of the Italian commedia dell’arte. During the 1600 s, Harlequin and a servant (later developed into the clown) became regulars at country fairs throughout England, and in the nearly 1700 s they appeared on London theatre stages as mute sequels to the main play of the evening. By then Harlequin had become a magician as well as a dazzling dancer, and his surprise tricks won accolades for decades.

Then, the clown rose to prominence, his tomfoolery making him lovable until the 1890 s.

But changes occurred that spelt doom for the Harlequin mute pieces as the essence of pantomime. Since the early days these had been introduced by short spoken acts and now innovators began to expand this portion.

Their models were new burlesques and extravaganzas, witty works based on fairy tales which made fun of the times. Women played men’s roles and men appeared as old ladies and girls. To introduce the fantasy were demon kings with devilish plots and fairy queens to reverse them.

What had so long been mute antics were now rhyming couplets and cuteness. By 1880, the new style of pantomime was more popular than ever. At Christmas that year various pantos played in nearly a dozen theatres in London alone. But even more changes were to occur. On the one hand, lavish scenery and huge processions became as important as words, and on the other, music hall jokes and tunes took the place of fairy stories.

It was the last influence, the music hall, that formed the short bridge to present-day pantomime: a loose, riotous show built around famous singers and celebrities. They bear the fairytale names of the past, from “Cinderella” to “Mother Goose,” and they have no shortage of spectacle or surprise, but their humour is as current as the content in a newspaper. This is the version that prompts arguments about the

state of panto every Christmas in theatres across the land. Does panto still please the people? Is this really panto? Wasn’t the show better the way it was in the past? Fortunately — and by a trick as neat as anything that pantomime ever devised — it is possible to prove the matter. Down a dark lane in the centre of London, the nineteenth century Victorian Age — and every Christmas time the kind of pantomime that came with it — still flourishes in the Players’ Theatre. It is housed in a pair of arches under the rumble of

trains from Charing Cross station and is the perfect period setting. Indeed, more than 100 years ago, these arches were already renowned as a music hall. Nightly, in a theatre once described as “little more than a rifle gallery” and under the cosy introductory banter of a chairman, the public ate, drank, and enjoyed the great names of the day.

And still they come, for the Players’ Theatre, after 40 years

at the premises, still offers nightly the food, drink, music, and even the chairman’s hearty toast to our “Queen” (... Victoria!) So it is inevitable, come Christmas, the theatre managers drew their works from J. R. Planche and H. J. Byron, the first great authors of extravaganza and burlesque pantomime. Once again the stage is alive with the literate fantasies that pleased a world long since gone.

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19861220.2.100.4

Bibliographic details

Press, 20 December 1986, Page 22

Word Count
737

Pantomimes: bouncy, bawdy, seasonal, and full of fun Press, 20 December 1986, Page 22

Pantomimes: bouncy, bawdy, seasonal, and full of fun Press, 20 December 1986, Page 22